Reproductive Tyranny FAIL

As everyone knows by now, that sleazy piece of legislative feculence known as “Motion 312” is gone, gone, like the snows of yesteryear. Or in the contemporary vernacular,

M312 FAIL!

Indeed.

When the deal finally went down on Wednesday afternoon, my final estimate on votes for and agin was just about right.

I predicted about 1/2 the CPC would vote “Yes”, simply because any more would make Harpie, who voted “No”, look bad: the actual vote was 52%. All in all, the slimy monster was defeated by more than 2 -1: a decisive defeat, if not the humiliating, crushing blow of my sadistic, seed-stealing, baby-killing, pants-dropping, man-hating feminazi dreams. But still, gone.

But so what? The Men Who Stare At Zygotes motion built a lot of momentum, thanks to Woodworth’s moving the vote forward from the original date in June. Rare is the anti-abortion motion that generates this kind of buzz, and it’s understandable that the fetus fetishists would be desperate to keep it going.

They even had a Companion Motion waiting in the hopper should M312 fail, and predictably and pathetically, tabled it immediately:

MPs may have voted overwhelmingly Wednesday to shut down discussion on Canada’s abortion laws, but another Conservative backbench MP has found a new way to keep the debate alive.

Anyway, the newest piece of antichoice offal being flogged, Motion 408, is a total non-starter and barely worthy of attention. It calls for the House to do no more than “condemn” a specific and rare practice, not make changes to Criminal Code definitions that would result in criminalizing abortion. I almost feel embarrassed for its proponents, so screamingly obvious is the real purpose of Motion 408: keep the M312 momentum going.

My uterus and I say “Thanks for stopping by, but we’re not buying what you’re selling”.

Some people are concerned, as they should be about any state initiative that has anything to do with reproductive rights, but a watchful eye is all that’s needed here. If Motion 408 is ignored, it will come and go without any affect on womens’ rights, and the Motion 312 hype, already fading, will disintegrate. Continuing to engage antichoicers over this new motion is exactly what they want. Until Motion 408 evolves into an existential threat, I say ignore it. I’d rather watch the fetus fetishists melt down into frustrated dung-puddles as all the M312 buzz melts away with them.

It’s the Outrage-du-Jour, or maybe just another way to try and slip one past the prochoice goalie; either way, I’m not convinced the practice is widespread enough in Canada to warrant the shrieking that goes on over it. The notion that it could result in a Canada top-heavy with males is absurd, but the idea of social engineering by the government as a legitimate means of avoiding this unlikely situation is loathesome in the extreme.

I will say that sex selection wouldn’t be my reason for having an abortion, but that’s my personal opinion and irrelevant in the context of anyone’s abortion but my own. For good or ill, the decision to terminate a pregnancy is the woman’s to make, and hers alone: not mine, yours or the state’s.

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7 Responses to “Reproductive Tyranny FAIL”

The only real way to ban sex-selective abortions using the law would be to ban ALL abortions, at least all those past the point at which sex determination is possible (which is how many weeks, exactly? Not sure here…)

It also raises an interesting paradox for the anti-choice movement. Are they saying that until sex determination (and therefore sex-selective abortion) is possible, a fetus COULD be aborted, because it isn’t really human? Unless that’s what they’re saying, and it’s a fairly ridiculous position, then what we have here is yet another attempt to sneak an abortion debate in through the back door.

You can rest assured that any initiative that has anything to do with ladyparts is an abortion initiative, some are just more of a threat than others.

If/when M408 evolves into a proposal to actually ban SS abortion, I’ll fight it. But as it stands, it’s just a proposal for the house to stand up & say “We don’t like sex selective abortion: so there!”: nothing more. It’s choreography, not lawmaking. The reat threat of this motion & its timing is that it gives fetus fetishists exactly what they want, a prolonged M312 “debate”.

In spite of its seeming simplicity (“Abortion is murder.”) I think you’ll find the antichoice position is full of paradoxes, and generally not well thought out. The whole idea of criminalizing something is to punish it, which in our society means jail time. Yet there aren’t many antichoicers who’ll cop to wanting to put women in jail for aborting, and the ones who do cop to it are pretty much universally loathed & recoiled from by normal people.

Has Canada so regressed that we think we live in China; or the Middle East?? This is just another sleazy, backdoor attempt to get abortion laws on the books, with complete disregard for Canadian Medical Docs and Women taking control over their own lives, and their choices. Its an attempt to get at least ‘some’ law on the books, and then chip away at it until they reach their ultimate goal of making abortion completely illegal in Canada.

So where is all the proof that sex-selective abortions are out of control in this Country, and majority of reputable and ethical Canadian Docs are performing them? Like every profession there are always some bad apples in a barrel… and I have no doubt there are some SS aborts are performed, especially in a multicultural country such as Canada. However, those that would/are doing this, there would be financial consideration involved between the parties that are partaking in this practice, just like any and all professions there are unethical and illegal activities that take place… only need to questionable ethics and practices of this government as the low bar to reach. But lets call it what it is… another typical and despicable motion by this Reform government; an attempt to take initiate the steps required to make abortion illegal! This is their ultimate agenda and mandate by these OLD White Patriarchal Male MPs, and the women within this party so indoctrinated by this androcentric mentality and who have no insight, nor ability to think beyond their evangelical ideology.

This crap will not end until this abhorrent Gov is kicked to the curb!

I see this new motion slightly different that you do JJ. I see it as what I predicted; that is that these guys will never stop. Never. They will continue to table motions until they get the tiniest bit of traction. Rest assured, if this sex selection motion passes, another motion will be tabled that day to expand upon that. They really don’t care if they fail 500 times, just so long as they get 1 success in there every now and then.

Look at the USA. 8 years ago when Bush was passing the partial birth abortion ban, things were looking pretty different access-wise than they are now. They have nipped away at women’s rights down there continually and our Canadian counterparts have taken notice of their successes. Motion 312 was the beginning, not the end.

That they got 33% of the house to vote in favour of this, despite the fear of Harper’s wrath, is a massive victory. Harper can’t kick that many people out of caucus and the fetishists know this. That Rona Ambrose and Jason Kenney have voted in favour is a major coup. If these guys still have their cabinet positions this time next month expect the CPC to completely ignore Harper and vote however they want on these motions in the future.

Harper is a lying POS and I agree that that half of his MPs (including Ministers) feel emboldened. If Harper really means that he does not want to touch abortion then Ambrose, Kenney, Van Loan, Fantino should be demoted. They’ve already managed to screw women in the developing countries that CIDA supports by excluding abortion in their maternal health program.

I think M408 is a very weak attempt to find out how to phrase things to get the most traction amoung MPs who are less than informed about Canada’s abortion policy. I don’t think we’ll have to put much energy into seeing it flop, but I’ll still participate in making sure my MP is as informed as possible, seen as HE’s Liberal and had to be all but clubbed over the head to vote NO on M312. I’m not worried. But I’m not going to look away either.